Days after Los Angeles County’s quarter-cent sales tax to help homeless residents went into effect, the Board of Supervisors has introduced a flurry of motions to tap into those funds for emergency and transitional shelters.

On Tuesday, a motion introduced by Supervisor Kathryn Barger will ask the board to approve two emergency winter shelters in the Antelope Valley. The shelters are needed, Barger said in her motion, because the 108-bed Lancaster Community Shelter was shut down over the summer at a time when homelessness in the Antelope Valley increased by 50 percent this past year to an estimated 4,559.

“In the winter months, temperatures in the Antelope Valley are near freezing, and last year, overnight lows reached 10-degrees Fahrenheit,” Barger wrote in her motion. “Life-threatening hypothermia can begin to set in when temperatures drop below 50-degrees Fahrenheit. Unsheltered individuals are at high risk of injury and harm due to exposure to the elements. This shelter crisis in the Antelope Valley has become an emergency and immediate action must be taken.”

Barger wants to use a blend of one time homeless prevention county funds for her district and money generated by Measure H to open the Lancaster National Guard Armory, where 125 beds can be installed nightly from November 10, 2017 through March 10, 2018. She also would like to open the former High Desert Multiple Ambulatory Care Center as a potential temporary 24-hour homeless shelter, for another $248,000.

The proposals and motions made are within the framework of how Measure H funds can be spent, specifically under one of the 21 strategies that fall under E8, said Jerry Ramirez, manager of the county’s Homeless Initiative.

Measure H, the quarter-cent sales tax, was passed by Los Angeles County voters in March to raise an estimated $355 million a year for 10 years to help homeless people transition into affordable housing units.

Many of those units are to be built under Proposition HHH, a parcel tax approved by voters in the city of Los Angeles in November.

Prop HHH is expected to raise $1.2 billion in bonds for the construction of 10,000 units of housing.

But until those units are built, Measure H funding can also go into countywide homeless prevention efforts, emergency winter shelters and other social services for people who are or could become homeless.

“There are certain interests they (Supervisors) have, that’s why you see this flurry of motions,” Ramirez said.

In this March 2017 file photo, cots are stacked at the Sylmar National Guard Armory, which is being converted into a full-time bridge shelter for homeless women after a vote by the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors.

Last week, for example, the Board voted unanimously voted to convert a mostly vacant U.S. National Guard armory in Sylmar into a year-round transitional housing facility for up to 80 homeless women who are close to securing permanent places to live.

The 5-0 vote means the Sylmar facility will become the first of its kind in the county to use Measure H funds for a bridge housing facility — a place where women who already are receiving services can wait for permanent housing.

“Those are the kind of motions we’re getting,” Ramirez said. “One of the hardest things we have to deal with are sites or locations. When there is an opportunity to move quickly on something, that helps the process.”

Also last week, the board passed a motion by Supervisor Janice Hahn that asked the board to utilize Measure H funds to increase shelter capacity and report back in 15 days.

“We are amassing tens of millions of dollars to construct affordable and permanent supportive housing,” Hahn said in her motion. “But these projects are complex and will require time to complete. Meanwhile, tens of thousands of people remain without even basic shelter.”

Hahn acknowledged that the shelter system isn’t perfect, nor will those emergency beds solve homelessness. But she said there is no other option yet until affordable housing is identified.

“We cannot wait any longer for housing to be constructed and brought on line,” she said in her motion. “The County is in a position to identify the necessary funding to immediately increase shelter beds that include services. We must act now.”

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